We believe that all students should benefit fully from a broad and balanced curriculum which makes a relevant and strong contribution to their education.

Our aims are:

• To develop the mathematical knowledge of students.
• To give students the confidence to use their mathematical abilities and skills.
• To develop an approach towards problem solving. 
• To develop social and communication skills

All students follow the Pearson Maths Progress Curriculum which features a strong emphasis on fluency, reasoning, problem-solving and mastery. As a maths department we have tailored this curriculum using our expertise to make it work for our students. Students are encouraged to work to their best ability and that they can succeed and that making mistakes is not failure but an opportunity for learning.  Distributed learning is a key principle and students experience starter and homework questions which regularly revisit key topics.

What is taught and how?

Year 7

All students receive 7 hours of maths lessons per fortnight. Students study the following topics: 

• Analysing and displaying data
• Number skills
• Expressions, functions and formulae
• Decimals and measure
• Fractions and percentages
• Probability
• Ratio and proportion
• Lines and angles
• Sequences and graphs
• Transformations

Year 8

All students receive 7 hours of maths lessons per fortnight. Students study the following topics: 

• Number
• Area and Volume
• Statistics, graphs and charts
• Expressions and equations
• Real-life graphs
• Decimals and ratio
• Lines and angles
• Calculating with fractions
• Straight-line graphs
• Percentages, decimals and fractions

We do believe in re-visiting some topics so that students gain further understanding and improve their confidence. 

Year 9

Students start to build on their knowledge learnt in years 7 and 8 with a bespoke maths course.  Students will either study the Higher or Foundation tier.  7 units of work are covered during the year.  In addition to unit tests the students sit an end of year exam in the summer term.  All students receive 7 hours of maths lessons per fortnight.

Year 10

Students continue to follow the bespoke maths course challenging them toward their GCSE exams.  9 units of work are covered during the year.  In addition to unit tests the students sit a GCSE mock exam in the summer term.  All students receive 8 hours of maths lessons per fortnight.

Year 11

Students finish the remaining units of the bespoke maths course and should be fully prepared for their GCSE exams.  They then sit 2 mock exams that are spread out so that tailored, bespoke revision can occur.  All students receive 8 hours of maths lessons per fortnight.

Assessment

All students should be able to identify what they know and how well they know it so talking in the language of maths and about maths is essential. However, the difficult part is putting these ideas into practice. In maths, powerful formative assessment techniques are needed to bring children’s ideas to the surface so we can build on their strengths, uncover any misconceptions and support knowledge upgrades towards a fuller understanding.

Activities like deliberate mistakes, odd one out or true-false statements can be used to improve the children’s mathematical literacy.

All units are assessed, and the students are given feedback where weaknesses can be identified and follow up work given.

Homework

We believe homework is an essential task that students must build into their studies.  If students attempt homework they will be inclined to revise for important exams and, in particular, their GCSE exams.

Our homework tasks feature topics and questions which students might have already met but their regular occurrence improves understanding and the students’ confidence in answering them.